Tommy woke up, when he saw lights appear from underneath the door. He heard the janitor unlock the door and he looked at his watch. It was 7:15! Without thinking he crossed the line that Kimberly placed on the floor. "Kim, Kim wake up," he whispered as he gently shook her.
"What are you doing on my side?" she asked angrily looking up into Tommy's eyes. "You agreed to stay-"
"-Kim, it's 7:15," Tommy interrupted. "We've got that Geometry test!"
Kimberly jumped out of her sleeping bag and folded it up and put it in the storage room. She immediately ran out of the locker room to get to her school locker and get her book bag and school books. She made it to Ms. Peterson's room and took a seat next to Aisha. "Where have you been?" Aisha questioned as Kimberly got out her note book and pencil. "I couldn't get a hold off you last night."
"It's a long-complicated story," she whispered looking around to make sure no one else could over hear. "I went into the locker room to get a shower. Guess what Tommy shows up! It's his fault that we got locked in there all night. My hair is a mess, my breath is horrible, and my clothes are all wrinkled."
"Are you still mad at him over what happened between the two of you yesterday?" Kat asked as she got out her math book and some clean sheets of paper. "He didn't mean to cause trouble for you."
Tommy walked in the room and took a seat next to Kimberly. He looked like he had really had a rough time. He was covered purple paint. "Tommy, what happened to you?" Billy asked opening his book bag and got out a handkerchief.
"They were painting the walls in the commons," he began wiping his face with the handkerchief. "The janitor accidently knocked a can of paint over and the next thing I know, I'm covered in paint."
Ms. Peterson walked into the room. She was a middle-aged lady with short black hair walked into the room. She had eyes like a hawk and never missed any small details. Her eyes locked on the floor when she saw a trial of purple paint foot printing coming into her classroom. The trail ended at the back of the room right in front of Tommy's desk. "Mr. Oliver, I have rules against students bringing messes into my class room," Ms. Peterson fussed putting her hands on her hips. "You also know that I expect my students to come to class neatly groomed-"
"-Ms. Peterson, a can of paint was accidently knocked over on me-"
"-Mr. Oliver, I don't need you to be making up a bunch of excuses," she declared while her eyes shifted to Kimberly when she noticed there were drips of paint on her clothes and there was a tear in her dress. "Mr. Oliver, please go to the family resource center, take a shower and put on some clean clothes. I don't want you to set a bad example for my students. Ms. Hart, you need to go to change too."
"Why me?" Kimberly gasped as her jaw dropped. She looked down at her clothes and saw her shirt had some purple dots from where paint dripped off Tommy's hair. And there was big tear in her dress. She had no idea that it was there. When she looked down at her dress there were purple lip prints on her skirt. "Never mind Ms. Peterson."
Kimberly and Tommy got up from their desks and left the class room. "Nice going, Tommy," she whispered as they walked down the hall. "Things can't get worse, can they."
Bulk and Skull were playing football in the hallway, which was close to a mop bucket. "Heads up, Skull," Bulk cried as he threw the football. The ball went flying throw the air, hitting the mop bucket and knocking it over. They continued to play football as Kimberly and Tommy were walking down the hall. Just as Kimberly and Tommy were walking by, Skull threw the ball to Bulk. He ran after the ball and bumped into Kimberly as soon as she stepped in the soapy water. The very minute he bumped into her, she went sliding across the floor. Tommy ran ahead to try to catch her. But, she knocked him down. Kimberly landed on top of him. Bulk threw the football to Skull and it hit a ladder. It was hit with so much force, it fell in the floor and broke. The can of paint sitting on top of it went flying and landed on Kimberly's back. She felt the cold slimy paint run down her body.
"Don't you two ever learn!" she shouted as she stood up. When she stood up, she noticed Tommy was laying on her jumper. Her face turned red with embarrassment as Tommy handed her the jumper. Kimberly snatched it out of his hand and wrapped it around herself to prevent anyone else from seeing her lacy undergarments. Tommy tried to help her, but she ran the rest of the way to the family resource center.
"Ms. Hart, I got a call from Ms. Peterson," began Ms. Tyler as she walked in. "She said you and Mr. Oliver were coming to change your clothes. Did you run into some trouble on the way here?"
"Bulk and Skull were playing football in the hall and knocked a mop bucket over. I slide across the floor and Tommy tried to catch me," Kimberly started as Tommy walked into to the room. "Then Bulk and Skull threw the football and it-"
"-knocked a ladder over and the ladder broke. A can of paint went flying through the air and it landed on Kim's back," Tommy interrupted as he was trying to catch his breath. "Kim got up and-"
"-my jumper dress was torn off," Kimberly finished. "Bulk and Skull saw my undergarments and I ran the rest of the way here."
"There is a bathroom in my office and in one Ms. Ames' office," Ms. Tyler informed as she handed them bath supplies, a disposable tooth brush, a towel, and a change of clothes that their parents brought in for them. Kimberly ran into the nearest and closed the door behind her.
Kimberly stepped out of the bath room dressed in a dark pink tee shirt, a light pink flannel shirt and jeans. "Thank you, Ms. Tyler," she stated as she handed Ms. Tyler back the bath supplies and the towel. She walked back to class with five minutes to spare.
"Where's Tommy?" Aisha whispered as Kimberly took her seat.
"Still getting cleaned up," Kimberly replied. "You wouldn't believe me about all of the drama that-"
"-Bulk and Skull caused by playing football in hallway," Kat finished looking up from her geometry book. "We could hear Mr. Kaplan yelling at them for making a big mess. He walked down the hall and they threw the football. It hit Mr. Kaplan on the head and knocked his toupee off."
"Where's Tommy?" Rocky questioned while he was finishing the last part of his study guide. "We only have five minutes until class starts. You know that if you're late, you won't be able to take the test."
Tommy walked in the room and met Ms. Peterson stand at her desk with her arms crossed. She walked around Tommy in circle staring at his khakis, white tee shirt, and his white, grey, and tan plaid flannel shirt. "You appear to be neatly groomed," she remarked as her eyes shifted to his hair. It was nicely washed, brushed, and pulled back into a ponytail. "Your hair looks more natural and cleaner. Mr. Oliver, you may go take a seat."
He quickly took a seat next Kimberly. When he took his seat, he noticed his chair with paint was sitting off in a corner. There was still a trail of purple foot prints that Tommy brought in when he first came to class. But, the paint had dried to the floor. He could have sworn that the mess would be all cleaned up by the time he returned to class.
The bell rang, and the rest of the class walked in and took their seats. "Okay class, we have our geometry test today," Ms. Peterson stated looking around her classroom making sure there was no empty seat. "This will be part of your first semester final exam. We will take the other part later."
This was one teacher that no one wanted to have, and most students struggled in her class. Why did people struggle in her class? She did very little teaching. In other words, all she did was write the assignment on the board, give a small lecture, and give maybe a few notes. While class was going on, students would go up to her desk and ask her for help. All she would tell them was to go look in their text book. After collecting home work, she started pass out all the testing materials. "You have the whole period. I assume everyone has a scantron sheet, scrap paper and a formula sheet," she announced. "Okay, you may begin. I'll let you what your grades were later this week."
In the middle of the day, both Kimberly and Tommy were called back to Ms. Peterson's room during her planning period. "What do you need, Ms. Peterson?" Kimberly asked when she took a seat in front of her desk. Tommy took a seat next to her. "You said our tests would not be graded until sometime this week."
"I don't need you making some smart remark, Ms. Hart!" she snapped as she slammed her door shut. "For your information, I have just finished running all of the scantron sheets through the scanner and I have everyone's grade! I see you and Mr. Oliver did poorly on the test. You know my rules, if you make below a C, you have to stay after school and retake it."
She handed Tommy and Kimberly their tests and they looked over them. They looked at their grades and were stunned that they'd have to take the test again. Kimberly should have made a 90 and Tommy made an 86. But, Ms. Peterson deducted 20 points off their grades. "Why did you deduct points off our grades?" Tommy questioned looking at his scantron sheet.
"You didn't have any reason to," Kimberly added.
Ms. Peterson grabbed her book and slammed it on the desk. "Yes, I did have a reason," she smirked as she held up their papers showing where they had worked the problems out. "You didn't, work your problems out, that is 10 points."
"Yes, we did work our problems out!" Tommy corrected. His whole face went blank when Ms. Peterson put their papers with the worked-out problems through the paper shredder. "Why did you just-"
"-Quiet, Mr. Oliver!" she yelled as the corner of her lips turned towards. "I'm not done yet! And I'm taking another 10 points off for not turning in your study guide."
They watched in terror as she ran their study guides through the paper shredders. "That's not fair!" Kimberly shouted watching the remains of her study guide fall out of the paper shredder. "Why are you doing this!?"
"After this year, I will have tenure at the end of this semester," she began walking back from the paper shredder. "Parents have been complaining on me ever since I began my teaching career. I had to leave a school because they said I wasn't teaching. So, I have redone my class syllabus where it states a student will have points taken of tests if they don't turn in their study guide or show their work-"
"-I think you are taking points off because you don't like us," Tommy interrupted. "And you never gave us a class syllabus at the beginning of the year."
"Mr. Oliver, you have in school detention," smiled Ms. Peterson and she opened her desk drawer. She got out an in-school detention referral and began to fill it out. "I'm putting you in there for trashing my room, calling me a liar, back talking, and trying to change your grade.
Kimberly's eyes locked on the scantron sheets when she saw a par of bright pink lip prints appear on hers and Tommy's scantrons. "Ms. Peterson, why did you kiss our scantron sheets?" Kimberly questioned nudging Tommy and he looked down at the tests.
The lip prints quickly jumped off their scantron sheets, before Ms. Peterson's eye landed on the two tests. "Ms. Hart, you'll be joining Mr. Oliver!" Ms. Peterson hissed picking up her pen and filling out another paper. "Apparently, you have mental problems. I can't have someone upsetting my students."
"When do we start in-school detention?" Kimberly asked. She felt Tommy take her hand in his underneath the table. "And how long do we have to be there?"
"You'll start now," Ms. Peterson smirked. She walked out of the room and brought back mops. "Both of you will mop up the purple paint foot prints that Mr. Oliver tracked in, after that you will scrub the paint of the chair that left paint on, and finally both of you will go outside and wash my car. It is covered in mud and dirt. I've been aiming to go to the car wash, but can't find time to go. You will be saving me a trip to the car wash-"
"You never told us how long we'll have to go to in school detention," Kimberly interrupted while she started to help Tommy mop up the floor.
Ms. Peterson sat at her desk until the floor was mopped up. "You've stay there for a month," she replied watching them trying to scrub the paint off the floor with brushes. "Maybe even longer. I forgot to mention that you'll be suspended from extra circular activities."
"Kim has important gymnastic competition and I have an important karate tournament!" Tommy cried watching Kimberly turn her head. "Our coaches have told us we have a good chance of making it to the state championship."
"Looks like someone else will get to go the championship instead of you," remarked Ms. Peterson as she started to walk out of her classroom. "I'm going to take these forms to Mr. Kaplan."
She walked out of the class room and closed the door behind her. "Now, I'm suspended from the gymnastics team and don't get to compete at the regionals," Kimberly sighed wiping her tears from her face. "Ms. Peterson is going to have it all over school I've got mental problems. I bet you think the same thing, don't you, Tommy?!"
He walked over to her and wrapped his arms around her. "You're just as sane as I am," he assured her stroking her hair. "I saw the lips too. I've been seeing lip prints lips in different colors. Either girls are wanting to show off their lip stick or Rita and Zedd is behind this."
"If they are behind it, why are we the only ones seeing them?" she asked. "I'm sure if the others saw what we saw, they would tell us. Usually, all of their monsters have been meant for all of us."
"Remember the Bloom of Doom, Guitardo, and Artistmole?" he reminded as she wiggled out of his arms. "Those were some of the monsters meant for one of us. What if this monster is targeting both of us?"
"Why would a pair of lips be targeting us-"
"-Kim, maybe they wanting to target two rangers this time."
"But, why us?" she replied picking up the mop. "What's so special about us."
"We have the animal spirits of the falcon and the crane. They are supposed to be the most powerful of all of our animal spirits," he guessed picking up the brush and started to scrub the floor. "Or maybe because they know we love each other. They could be trying to break us up. You may be angry at me, Kim. But, I know deep down you don't want that. Not too long ago, you told me that you wished that I'd be moving to Paris at the end of the year with you or you would get to stay in Angel Grove with me."
"I don't see how that will happen-"
"-Kim," he interrupted as he walked over to his book bag. He got out a small box wrapped in pink wrapping paper. "I promise you that we'll stay together no matter what. I meant to give you this at your gymnastics party. When the time is right, I want you to open this. Then you'll understand."